My Thoughts Are Stars I Cannot Fathom Into Constellations

So with all the hype of the movie release of John Green's The Fault In Our Stars, I decided to take the morning to reread that great lagniappe* of a book.

BAH.

BAHHHHHH.

BAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Rereading the book was delightful as I rediscovered the wit, romance, and pain that enchanted me on my first read. I am so excited/anticipatory/pumped/stoked/etc. about the movie release. I bought the soundtrack which is PERFECT. For anyone who doesn't know, there is a chance to a pre-showing of TFIOS on June 5th at select theaters. "The Night Before Our Stars" includes a live screening with actors, directors, and of course, John.

 

"My thoughts are stars I cannot fathom into constellations."

This is definitely one of my favorite quotes in the book, because it describes my dilemma with writing perfectly. My mind is full of characters, phrases, and worlds that all have so much potential. Ideas and shadows of dreams fill up notebooks and word documents and margins of notebook paper. What is holding them back from becoming stories? Why won't they connect? I have no trouble forming a coherent essay in school, but without guidelines, I feel trapped in my own imagination.

Sometimes I find that the rules of English and society hinder my writing. I fear a dangling participle as much as a rebuke from an offended reader. I want to talk about Stuff People Don't Talk About, but finding the line between brutal honesty and TMI is really hard sometimes. Plus, it has been drilled in my head for years that a misused comma is bad work, a sentence fragment is meaningless. While I appreciate grammar VERY much, I know it is hurting my writing. I just can’t find the balance.

Many times it seems there just aren’t enough words in human language (at least between the English I know and the bits of Spanish and French I have taken in school). Sometimes I will be writing something that makes perfect sense in my heart, but is nonsense on paper. How will there ever be enough words to describe the torment and ecstasy of a teenage mind? Maybe we should make some new ones.

I feel pity for the ideas in my head that don’t get a voice. I want to give them clarity, but alas, my thoughts are stars I cannot fathom into constellations.

John Green* encouraged young writers by saying this: “Don’t make stuff because you want to make money, it will never make you enough money. Don’t make stuff because you want to get famous because you will never feel famous enough. Make gifts for people and work hard on making those gifts in the hope that those people will notice and like the gifts. Maybe they will notice how hard you worked and maybe they won’t, and if they don’t notice, I know it’s frustrating, but ultimately, that doesn’t change anything because your responsibility is not to the people you’re making the gift for but to the gift itself.”

So self, what do you have to give?

 

 

*A terrifically better word for a gift or benefit.

*Side Note: I do love many many authors besides John Green. Just on a bit of a John-high right now with all the excitement and whatnot. (: